Norway Suspect Denies Guilt and Suggests He Did Not Act Alone

People comforted one another as thousands gathered outside Oslo's City Hall on Monday for a vigil in memory of the victims of last week's deadly attacks.Credit
Erlend Aas/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

OSLO — Anders Behring Breivik, the anti-immigrant extremist who is charged in the bombing and shooting rampage in his native Norway, told a judge on Monday that he did it to save the country from ruin, denied that he was guilty of any crime and hinted for the first time that he had collaborators.

Mr. Breivik’s remarks at a closed-door custody hearing were relayed by the judge, Kim Heger, at a news conference. The police said later they were not ruling out the possibility that Mr. Breivik’s claim of accomplices, which he described as “two more cells” in an organization he called Knights Templar, was accurate. But they also noted that he had previously told them he had acted alone.

Some security analysts, like Tore Bjorgo, a professor at the Norwegian Police University College and an expert on right-wing extremism, were also skeptical, questioning whether the Knights Templar organization that Mr. Breivik claimed in his manifesto to have helped form in 2002 really existed or was simply an effort to claim a more elaborate history and role.

Mr. Breivik became much more extreme in the last two or three years, Mr. Bjorgo said. “That’s why I have some real doubt about this Templar claim in 2002,” he said. “It doesn’t correspond to his history. I’m not convinced it’s a real organization. It could be a fantasy or a threat, or it could be to try to show that he is part of a larger network.”

Mr. Breivik’s brief appearance at an Oslo courthouse on a cold misty day came as Norwegians were still grappling with the enormity of the attacks on Friday that amounted to one of the worst mass killings in postwar Europe. By Monday evening, at least 100,000 mourners had converged on Oslo to honor the victims and repudiate the suspect’s ideology of hatred toward Muslims and advocates of multiculturalism, who he said were ruining Norway and threatening Western European civilization.

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REMEMBERING In Oslo, people joined in a “rose march,” as the suspect in Friday's killings hinted that he had collaborators. Credit
Emilio Morenatti/Associated Press

The judge ordered Mr. Breivik held in jail for eight weeks, half of it in isolation, with no access to the outside except through his lawyer. The judge refused to open the hearing to the public, arguing that evidence could be ruined. Mr. Breivik, who had asked for an open hearing to explain his actions and his views about Muslims and to wear some sort of uniform, was denied on both counts. He was photographed in a car leaving the hearing wearing a red sweater embossed with a Lacoste alligator emblem.

Judge Heger said Mr. Breivik had been charged with “acts of terrorism,” including an attempt to “disturb or destroy the functions of society, such as the government” and to spread “serious fear” among the population. At the televised news conference, the judge said Mr. Breivik had acknowledged carrying out the attacks but had pleaded not guilty, because he “believes that he needed to carry out these acts to save Norway” and Western Europe from “cultural Marxism and Muslim domination.”

The police also revised the death toll downward to 76 from 93, saying that eight people were now known to have died in the bomb blast in central Oslo, one more than before, and 68 on the island of Utoya, instead of 86. The police said they had been too occupied with searching for the dead and missing to confirm their counts, and to prevent further confusion, they said, they declined to provide any figure for those still missing.

Legislators said a list of the dead might not be available until next Monday or Tuesday, when they planned to hold a memorial ceremony, followed by funerals all over Norway.

Mr. Breivik’s estranged father, a retired career Norwegian diplomat, expressed shock and despondency over the news that his son was a mass killer, in an interview published by Expressen, a Swedish tabloid, done from southern France, where he lives. The father, Jens David Breivik, said he was overcome with grief for the victims, might never return to Norway and hoped that others would not blame him for his son’s actions. “He should have taken his own life, too,” the father said. “That’s what he should have done.”

At noon on Monday, there was a minute of silence for the victims throughout Norway and other Nordic countries, followed by the evening memorial gathering outside Oslo’s City Hall, where many of the participants carried white or red roses. “Tonight the streets are filled with love,” Crown Prince Haakon told the crowd.

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TimesCast | Norway Suspect In Court

The man accused of devastating twin attacks in Norway appeared in a closed arraignment hearing, claiming that he didn't act alone.

Mr. Breivik’s hearing also brought out many ordinary people, still shocked and fascinated by the man accused of blowing up the main government building and then murdering so many Norwegian children, one bullet at a time, from his legally purchased rifle and handgun.

Up to 1,500 people filled the narrow streets around the courthouse, especially in the back, near the entrance to the underground garage where they believed Mr. Breivik would be brought in.

The crowd was mostly quiet and pensive, as if in mourning, but some people expressed anger, too, shouting at a car they thought might be carrying Mr. Breivik. Naim Alizadeh, 20, hit the vehicle as his friend, Alexander Roine, 24, screamed repeatedly: “You traitor! Get out of the car! Long live Norway!”

“I’m here to show that everyone hates him, and that he’s not a hero,” said Mr. Alizadeh, a McDonald’s employee who moved to Norway from Afghanistan at age 13. He said he had two friends on the island — one dead, one wounded.

“People want to see face-to-face the guy who did this,” said Bernt Almbakk, 31, a lawyer. “It’s very personal. This is a small country.” Rather than anger, Mr. Almbakk said, “it’s the sorrow and the feelings — it’s been a very hard weekend with a lot of tears.”

Harald Stanghelle, the political editor of the newspaper Aftenposten, said that “coming here is a way to participate.” Norway, he said, “is a country of grief and sorrow, trying to overcome a great shock. There’s a hope to participate and be together.”

At one point, there was clapping in the crowd. From the front of the courthouse came a newlywed couple. “It was a glimpse of normal life in this film of horror,” Mr. Stanghelle said.

Reporting was contributed by Elisa Mala from Oslo, Christina Anderson from Stockholm, Alan Cowell from Paris and Rick Gladstone from New York.

A version of this article appears in print on July 26, 2011, on page A8 of the New York edition with the headline: Norway Extremist Denies Guilt and Suggests He Was Not Acting Alone. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe